Terror Suspect Brought to AZ, Pleads not Guilty

PHOENIX (CN) – Suspected terrorist Ahmad Ibrahim Al-Ahmad pleaded not guilty Thursday to supplying components for roadside bombs that killed American soldiers in Iraq. The Syrian national was first charged in 2011 in a sealed indictment and arrested and held in Turkey. He arrived in Phoenix on Wednesday and made an initial appearance in federal court the next day. A federal grand jury returned a recently unsealed superseding indictment earlier this month alleging that Al-Ahmad was part of a conspiracy to use improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to attack U.S. military personnel in Iraq from approximately 2005 to 2010. The indictment claims that he “procured component parts for wireless initiation systems” from an as-yet unnamed Arizona company that were used by the 1920 Revolution Brigade in radio-controlled IEDS. Investigators said IED components recovered from two attacks on soldiers in Baghdad in 2007 matched others recovered from a home that Al-Ahmed allegedly used to manufacture “wireless initiation systems” for IEDs. The charges against Al-Ahmed include conspiracy to maliciously damage or destroy U.S. government property by means of an explosive; possession of a destructive device during a crime of violence and aiding and abetting; conspiracy to commit extraterritorial murder of a U.S. national, and providing material support to terrorists. Al-Ahmed will remain temporarily in the custody of the U.S. marshal. His trial is scheduled for Oct. 7 in Phoenix before U.S. District Judge Neil Wake.